The work of Danish architect and urbanist Jan Gehl is closely associated with major urban transformation projects in cities such as Copenhagen, Melbourne, Sydney, London, Moscow, and New York. His thinking helps bridge a crucial gap between placemaking and successful retail real estate by focusing on what has long been overlooked: the human scale.
For decades, cities were designed around traffic flows, zoning efficiency, and architectural ideologies. People adapted as best they could. Gehl turned this logic on its head with a simple but radical insight: first we shape cities – then they shape us. If cities are to be lively, resilient, and economically successful, they must be designed for the human body, human senses, and human behavior.
Today, this principle is more relevant than ever. As retail real estate faces structural change driven by e-commerce, shifting consumer expectations, and the demand for sustainable urban environments, Gehl’s book Cities for People provides a compelling framework for rethinking how retail fits into the future city.
This article was published in ACROSS Issue 1|2026
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Cities as Social Ecosystems
At the heart of Gehl’s work lies a critique of postwar urban planning. Cities were increasingly treated as machines: functions were separated, distances stretched, streets widened, and human presence reduced to a secondary effect. The consequences are visible in many cities today – empty plazas, hostile streetscapes, and retail locations that struggle despite strong demographics.
Gehl’s research shows that urban life is a self-reinforcing process. Where people are invited to walk, stop, sit, and observe, more people follow. Where nothing happens, nothing happens. Cities such as Copenhagen and Melbourne demonstrate that reallocating space from cars to pedestrians does not reduce urban vitality – it multiplies it.
Pedestrianization, smaller blocks, and dense networks of inviting streets increase footfall, dwell time, and social interaction. For retail real estate, this insight is critical: footfall is not generated by retail alone, but by urban life itself.
The Human Measure
Humans experience cities at walking speed – roughly five kilometers per hour. Our senses are oriented horizontally, forward-facing, and limited in range. We perceive details, faces, materials, and activities at close distances. Urban environments that ignore this scale risk becoming irrelevant.
Gehl shows that only the first few floors of buildings meaningfully interact with street life. Ground-floor design is therefore decisive for urban quality. Long, monotonous façades and blank walls make distances feel longer and discourage walking.
Successful cities – and successful retail streets – are composed of short visual intervals. Narrow storefronts, frequent entrances, changing façades, and visible activity ensure that pedestrians encounter something new every few seconds. This rhythm keeps people curious, engaged, and willing to stay. For retail developers, this challenges the logic of large, inward-facing formats and monolithic façades.
Life First, Space Second
One of Gehl’s most influential principles is the sequence: life → space → buildings. Too often, placemaking focuses on aesthetic upgrades or branding exercises without addressing how people actually use space. According to Gehl, meaningful placemaking begins with careful observation: where people naturally walk, where they slow down, where they feel safe enough to stop, and where social interaction feels comfortable.
Public life thrives in transition zones – the blurred edges between private and public space. Shopfronts, café terraces, steps, display zones, and semi-covered areas allow people to linger without obligation. These “soft edges” are where urban life happens.
Retail real estate plays a pivotal role here. Shops are not merely transactional units; they are interfaces between city life and private enterprise. When well designed, they contribute to urban vitality far beyond their sales area.
Retail Real Estate in the City for People
In a city designed for people, retail real estate is not an isolated asset class but part of a broader social infrastructure that supports daily life, encounter, and well-being. The most successful retail destinations of the future will not be those that try to outcompete the city, but those that integrate seamlessly into it.
Urban quality is not created through scale, speed, or spectacle, but through attention to the small, the slow, and the human. Embracing this philosophy has clear strategic implications for retail real estate:
- Retail performance is closely linked to the quality of the surrounding public realm. Pedestrian comfort, safety, and attractiveness directly influence dwell time and spending.
- Upper floors may generate rent, but ground floors generate life. Transparent façades, frequent entrances, and visible activity are fundamental to long-term value.
- Streets with many narrow storefronts consistently outperform those with fewer, wider units in terms of engagement, with implications for leasing strategies and tenant mix.
- Retail spaces embedded in lively urban environments benefit from emotional connection. People do not visit cities to optimize – they visit to experience, observe, and participate.
- Gehl advocates observing and measuring human behavior: counting pedestrians, noting where people stop, sit, or avoid. Retail operators can apply the same mindset to understand performance beyond sales per square meter.
Cities for People
In this book, Jan Gehl presents his work creating or recreating cityscapes on a human scale. He explains the methods and tools to reconfigure unworkable cityscapes into the landscapes he believes they should be: cities for people. Taking into account changing demographics and changing lifestyles, Gehl explains how to develop cities that are lively, safe, sustainable, and healthy. The book is extensively illustrated with over 700 photos and drawings of examples from Gehl’s work around the globe.
About Jan Gehl
Jan Gehl, born in Denmark in 1936, is an architect, former Professor at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts (1966–2006), and founding partner of Gehl Architects. His books, including Life Between Buildings and Cities for People, have been published in more than 40 languages. He has received numerous international awards for his contribution to urban planning. Although he retired in 2016, Gehl remains an influential voice in the global movement to create better cities for people.
